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We found some lions at N’waswitshaka on the S65.

He was favouring his hind leg — good news is it looked a whole lot better when we saw him again later in the day. Prolly got himself kicked by a zebra or something.

In the shade of the dam wall.

And on the other side, in the shade of a tree.

Nothing much was happening so we went off, came back later.

There were elephant at the water hole, being watched very intently by the lions, who had moved off into the bushes.

But the elephants smelled them and chased them away. This all happened in the bush so no pics, sorry. The lions basically went to ground, with the male actually moving further than the two females. We then watched the females slowly moving back towards the dam, eventually the male joined them (the three on the other side had moved off somewhere that way, they also came back later).

Nothing as exciting as last time.

I suppose they’d seek shade soon. This was half past eight in the morning.

We’ve passed this tree many many times. Regular Krugerholics will know it. There are always wildebeest parked off under it.

Hmmm, that ain’t no wildebeest…

Nesting Secretary birds. They’re named for the feathers looking like pens stuck behind a secretary’s ear… or are they?

Nesting Lappet-faced vultures. These were both the same morning on the S37, and the next day neither of them were in the nests.

One of many Kori Bustards we saw. You normally see one on its own, maybe another one a few hundred meters away.

Martial Eagle.

Southern Ground Hornbill are supposed to be kind of scarce, there are signs up at the Parks Offices that they would welcome reports of the whereabouts of these birds (we leave that to people who know what they are doing, we’re not fluent in Bird yet).

But we pretty much always see them, and mostly in groups (we saw a solitary one only once, and we saw… I think 17 in total this time). This was a group of four close to Kumana dam.

Also close to Kumana dam, we found this Bateleur feeding on… something. Maybe a jackal.

Fish Eagles remain stunning.

Verreaux’s Eagle Owl close to Transport Dam.

Nesting Idunno, maybe Wahlberg’s Eagle, maybe Tawny, quite far away.

Ground Hornbill, up a tree.

Fish Eagles seen from the deck at Lower Sabie. 600mm lens zoomed all the way in. We need better glass…

Found us some lions at the Kumana dam.

They were just parked off, doing the lion’ around thing.

But wait! What’s that? (Apart from the very nervous giraffe, that is).

We have incoming heffalumps.

Some of the elephant crossed the road, but a few smelled the lions and decided to have none of it (click to embiggen).

Lions everywhere. Some ran across the road and into the main herd of elephant who had crossed the road earlier. Trumpeting in stereo. Lion’s arses disappearing into the bush. It was fun. I think even the elephants enjoyed it. The lions maybe not so much.

This one went to ground just after crossing the road, allowing the elephant to run past. Sound strategy that we would see again later.

We drove down to Tshokwane for breakfast, and when we came back the lions had regrouped under a tree, again just lion’ there.

But the road block was on the other side of the road. A leopard, apparently. Just down the bank by the side of the road, but there was a german Unimog parked right on top of it and no matter how I jockeyed, we had no chance. Our friends from Hoedspruit saw the leopard later.

I think they were just too late to see the actual kill, but the lions had found them a buffalo at the waterhole. Timing is everything.

That was Saturday. This was what was left, Monday morning.

It seems like endless herds of elephant pitch at Nsemani dam, play around a bit and  then move on.

Dunno if they’re playing or shagging but it looks like they’re having fun.

And off they go.

Next morning at the elephant carcass, the buffet was still in full swing.

One of the hyenas crossed the river to come investigate this strange contraption with the lenses poking out.

We have previously had some marvellous sightings,  so let me say, straight off the bat, this trip was not so good for sightings. We had some really good experiences, however.

For example, we saw some wild dogs on the first day. But unlike the 2016 trip, where we had them in the road first thing, they were too far into the bush for a decent photograph.

On the S147, not far from where we watched a mom & baby leopard last time,  there was an elephant carcass with hyena and vultures all over it (more about this later).

We had elephants chase lions three times.

We saw hyenas playing, interesting birds, tiny elephant, lions wreaking havoc with a herd of impala… all in all it was a good trip.

But it really bugs me how blasé we’ve become.